25Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?

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25 Verse 25. Therefore] διατουτο, on this account; viz., that ye may not serve mammon, but have unshaken confidence in God,I say unto you,-

Take no thought] Be not anxiously careful, μημεριμνατε; this is the proper meaning of the word. μεριμνα anxious solicitude, from μεριζειντοννουν dividing or distracting the mind. My old MS. Bible renders it, be not bysy to your life. Prudent care is never forbidden by our Lord, but only that anxious distracting solicitude, which, by dividing the mind, and drawing it differentways, renders it utterly incapable of attending to any solemn or important concern. To be anxiously careful concerning the means of subsistence is to lose all satisfaction and comfort in the things which God gives, and to act as a mere infidel. On the other hand, to rely so much upon providence as not to use the very powers and faculties with which the Divine Being has endowed us, is to tempt God. If we labour without placing our confidence in our labour, but expect all from the blessing of God, we obey his will, co-operate with his providence, set the springs of it a-going on our behalf, and thus imitate Christ and his followers by a sedate care and an industrious confidence.

In this and the following verses, our Lord lays down several reasons why men should not disquiet themselves about the wants of life, or concerning the future.

The first is, the experience of greater benefits already received. Is not the life more than meat, and the body thanraiment? Can he who gave us our body, and breathed into it the breath of life, before we could ask them from him, refuse us that which is necessary to preserve both, and when we ask it in humble confidence?

The clause what ye must eat, is omitted by two MSS., most of the ancient versions, and by many of the primitive fathers. Griesbach has left it in the text with a note of doubtfulness. It occurs again in , and there is no variation in any of the MSS. in that place. Instead of, Is not the life more than, &c., we should read, Of more value; so the word πλειον is used in , and by the best Greek writers; and in the same sense it is used in . See the note there.